Old mate Barnaby has had a tough week. If having your private life splashed across the front pages for weeks, embarrassing your ex-wife, your kids and being publicly shut down by the Prime Minister is your ambition, then we have the answer for you. We’ve put together the guide to being a naughty boy in the workplace, Barnaby Joyce style.

If the politicians don’t behave, how long until the PM calls for a Bonking Royal Commission? #BarnabyJoyce#auspol

Step 1: Get elected

If you’re not the best looking bloke, or prone to going beetroot red after a few shandies, one of the great aphrodisiacs is power. Being a politician won’t make you attractive to everyone, but it widens the net – particularly if your chosen profession is accounting.

Step 2: Build a profile that stands out

Canberra is filled with politicians nobody either knows, remembers or cares about. To penetrate (pun not intended) outside the Canberra bubble, you’ve got to do a few things to get noticed. Laying a foundation for how he lives his personal life, Barnaby voted against his own party in 2011. The party hated that but they helped him build a profile regardless.

Not in parliament? Then perhaps try a LinkedIn profile that’s sure to attract the babes.

Step 3: Get active with your colleagues

Step 4 – Make good use of your office resources

If being elected, having a profile and hitting the gym isn’t enough, you can always use taxpayer dollars to fund your love life. This is a hard one to replicate for the average Joe, but if you’re a former accountant from Tamworth with a propensity for more than a few Froth Whitlams, you use everything to your advantage.

BREAKING: Labor says taxpayer money from a department administered by Barnaby Joyce has gone to a business owned by his mate who supplied the free apartment in Armidale #auspol

So What Can We Learn From Barnaby?

‘It’s been 10 minutes and no reply… did I go too far?’

We know Barnaby successfully managed steps 1 to 4, but what would Barnaby be thinking now? Having never destroyed a marriage, had four kids, nationally embarrassed four kids or had a Prime Minister publicly question my morals and ethics, I can only assume that Barnaby might share the following lessons.

Tell us, please, @david_day_ famous Australian Prime Ministerial biographer. Has any PM ever so publicly humiliated his Deputy PM in the manner Malcolm Turnbull did – rightly, in my view – to Barnaby Joyce, today?#Auspol

Thanking Your Family For Their Support (The Right Way)

If you are going to have an affair, best to deal with your marriage problems first. Living on the road for 24 years as your wife raises your four daughters is a questionable marriage tactic – best not to thank them by having an affair with your staffer and then having it on show to the world.

Taxpayer-Funded Poon Travel Is Not Always The Best Travel

Don’t claim travel allowance if you head to Canberra to continue your affair. Taxpayers pay for that, and we struggle enough paying for our own dates let alone the Deputy Prime Minister’s.

In short, this is a man who has earned $416,000 a year for nearly two years and likes to give cost of living advice to capital city residents. He also accepted party funds to keep him going for six weeks during a byelection caused by his own non-compliance with the constitution

People Will Always Point Out Your Double Standards

If you’re going to claim that same-sex marriage is immoral, make sure you’re not having an affair as you say it. Double standards are never very nice, particularly when it affects people that are genuinely in love.

Barnaby’s Final Piece Of Life Advice

If you want to have an affair then be prepared to put it all on the line. Your family, job and public reputation needs to be worth the gamble. Barnaby was known as a loveable larrikin and one of the great retail politicians. Now he’s the amorous root-rat who’s no doubt regretting his actions.